What type of water should be used in the steam autoclave？

Steam autoclaves play a vital role in general medical practice. They are used to sterilize medical equipment, tools and other objects, inactivating bacteria, fungi, spores and viruses.

Water is the lifeblood of the laboratory autoclave. The quality of the water you use will greatly affect the life of your autoclave and steam generator.

Can tap water be used in autoclave?

Commonly used water is tap water, bottled water, refrigerator filtered water or other filtration systems. Depending on your geographic location and the type of filtration system, these types of water contain a variety of dissolved minerals and salts, and the amount of dissolved water can vary widely.

Tap water contains a variety of dissolved minerals and salts. Depending on your geographic location and water sources (e.g. Wells, lakes, rivers, etc.), the dissolved levels can be very high. The more minerals in water, the harder it becomes. When hard water is boiled into pressurized steam, it leaves behind salt and mineral deposits that over time look like a light cream of paint or sand. These deposits are completely harmless to human health and only require a removal process called descaling. Regular descaling when necessary can avoid the decrease in efficiency and function of steam sterilizer.

How do I know I’m drinking hard water?

1. If all your feeding units or cutlery have white dry water stains.

2. If the steam sterilizer heating plate always has a white sandy residue.

Distilled water for steam autoclave

The best requirement for steam autoclave is distilled water. Distilled water is deionized or pure water, which is distilled through a process to remove impurities from the water and provide the cleanest possible water. Distilled water is usually 99.9% pure and is best for steam autoclaves to avoid problems or damage to the steam autoclave. We must realize that filtered water is very different from distilled water. While a process like reverse osmosis is an ultrafiltration, it’s still not as pure as distilled water, because there may still be a lot of contaminants, and some ions can’t be removed by filtration. Distillation can even remove stubborn contaminants, including sodium and minerals.

What should I do if I am faced with a damaged autoclave due to poor water quality?

When your steam autoclave experiences water quality damage, there are usually three levels of damage to your steam autoclave. For level 1 damage, which is usually the least damage, you can take advantage of the integrated automatic generator blowdown function to help drain. For secondary damage, you can use a water filtration or purification system, as described in the previous section. The water system will help remove minerals from the steam generator and provide pure water for the steam generator. For the last level of damage, which is usually the severe stage of the damage, you may need to call the expert team or purchase a new steam boiler or purchase a new autoclast.

We have a full range of high capacity steam sterilizers, providing the perfect solution for the smallest facilities to the largest central sterilizing supply departments. Sterilizers offer: versatility, safety, high performance, low cost of ownership and traceability. Designed to provide best-in-class solutions to reduce energy and water consumption, thus providing users with the lowest operating cost per load.

Yg-0.6 Pulse Vacuum Steam Sterilizer is suitable for hospitals, clinics, laboratories etc. They are designed to safely and effectively sterilize a wide range of items, such as packaged or unpackaged items, instruments and utensils.

The steam sterilization cycle usually consists of the following stages:

Pretreatment stage: air will inhibit sterilization and must be removed from the cavity and hollow body of the instrument. The pre-conditioning stage consists of conditioning and (as required) emptying. Steam is injected during the adjustment stage to produce overpressure in the sterilization chamber. Empty the steam sterilizer of the resulting air-steam mixture. The process is repeated up to three times in an autoclave. The degassing stage ensures that there is no residual air inside the sterilization chamber and hollow instrument.

Heating stage: the continuous introduction of steam creates pressure and temperature rise in the sterilization chamber.

Sterilization phase/exposure phase: The sterilization phase begins as soon as process-specific sterilization parameters are reached. Normally, the load is exposed to a set temperature of 134°C and held for 5.5 minutes. Instruments and textiles that are sensitive to heat or humidity can be disinfected at 121 °C using a gentle procedure for a holding time of minutes. 20.5 minutes.

Pressure release stage: release the pressure from the sterilization chamber through the exhaust valve when the pressure holding time is reached.

Drying stage: Depending on the sterilization method used, instruments and packages are dried by vacuum drying or high pressure drying.

Ventilation/exhaust stage: After the sterilization process is completed, the autoclave draws ambient air into the steam sterilizer chamber through an air filter to exhaust the sterilizer chamber to atmospheric pressure. The steam sterilizer door can now be opened and the retreated instrument removed.

If you have been using tap water in an autoclave and would like to have it cleaned and restored to the correct shape, please contact us for more information and assistance.